- Written by Jeremy Whitley, Art by Brenda Hickey, Coloring by Amy Mebberson
Princess Celestia offers Sunburst access to Star Swirl's private study for his research. There, he reads about one of the most difficult tasks that Star Swirl had to do: making Celestia and Luna come to appreciate each other.
In flashback, before Luna became Nightmare Moon, Star Swirl teaches the two about magic, but Celestia is clearly more powerful, and taunts her younger sister. Looking to try to gain Star Swirl's favor, Luna tries to cast powerful magic without luck. Celestia appears and starts to tease her, only making Luna more frustrated as she tries to cast the most powerful spell out of a book. The spell opens a portal to an alternate dimension that draws Luna in before Celestia can stop it. Horrified at this, Celestia races to get Star Swirl's help.
Star Swirl re-opens the portal, and he and Celestia enter the alternate dimension, one of many that Star Swirl is aware of. He opts to use caution to track Luna by magic, but Celestia races ahead to save her sister. She finds Luna held in place by tiny golems, trying to fit a helmet on her as they sense a dark power within her. Celestia quickly puts an end to their threat, but this reveals that a much larger golem, the one calling out to Luna, is waiting for them. Star Swirl appears in time and tells the sisters to run back to the portal while he deals with the golem. The sisters make their way back to their world. Celestia apologizes to Luna for being mean and always taunting her magic for being weak, knowing she had no right to bully her for what she said and promises to be a good and more better big sister and encourages Luna to keep on try and use her magic to be more better at how hard she tries and make sure the portal stays open to allow Star Swirl's return. The sisters embrace each other, just as Star Swirl tumbles out of the portal safely. Star Swirl's epilogue notes that the sisters learned the importance of having each other. Sunburst returns the book to Celestia next morning and as she and Luna laugh at their past, Sunburst grabs another book about another pony's history.
Tropes:
- Bait-and-Switch: As Sunburst is reading the book, he finds a mention about the most challenging task Star Swirl had ever faced and it is at this point when flashback part begins, with Star Swirl using his magic and shouting "Halt, knave! Go no further!" as if he was fighting some kind of villain. Cue the next page, he's actually berating teenage Princess Celestia for bullying her sister, while the extremely challenging task turns out to be "teaching".
- Call-Forward: The story makes references to Luna becoming Nightmare Moon, such as hearing a voice that tempts her to turn against Celestia and fitting her with armor she would wear while in the persona.
- Continuity Nod: Luna is in her regular blue mane rather then the glittering star one she normally has, a sign that she hasn't reached full princess status yet. Likewise Celestia's mane isn't flowing as it normally does when she was younger.
- Character Development: When Celestia was young, she was snobby, rude, boastful and treated Luna unfairly for her poor magic. But when Luna opens a portal and gets sucked in, she blames herself and becomes remorseful for teasing her one and only sister. After rescuing her, Celestia becomes nicer and promises to teach Luna how to be better at magic.
- Hypocritical Heartwarming: When Celestia charges in to rescue Luna from the golems, she does so while declaring "Only I get to pick on my sister!"
- Moment Killer: Just as Celestia and Luna reconcile and hug after escaping the dark dimension, Starswirl comes barreling through the portal right in between them. He even admits he ruined the moment there.
- Retcon:
- Celestia reveals Starswirl disappeared before Luna's banishment, refuting the "Reflections" story arc which showed and required him being around afterwards.
- The Journal of the Two Sisters had Celesta and Luna "far" older than the adult Founders of by the time they gained their cutie marks. Here, they had their marks as teenagers. Younger Celetia's personality is also quite different than what Journal presented.
- Tempting Fate: Near the end of the story, Starswirl writes that seeing the sisters reconcile that the two have overcome their differences and nothing will split them up again. Of course as we know that wouldn't be the case after he disappeared, at least not for a few millennia before the Mane Six fixed things.
